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Tuesday, May 31, 2011

[I couldn't get the jpg. file clear enough to read, so I variously copied and pasted, and transcribed the relevant headlines and links from Drudge. In the cases of two since-removed headlines, I had to Google and guess at the proper links.]

The reader will have noted that I did not say Knight “allegedly” committed the crime; that is because he confessed to police at the crime scene. (Yeah, I got the memo: 'Confessions by black felons never count.' I'm just choosing to ignore the memo. See below.)

On rare occasion, an innocent but simple-minded black man has confessed to a crime. The defense bar and journalists who support black felons have joined forces to seek and get countless black felons off, and to make law enforcement’s job impossible.

The basis for the “innocent-black-men-confessing” ruse is the 1963 Career Girls Murders, in which innocent, slow-witted black George Whitmore Jr., 19, was induced to confess to a rapes and murders of Emily Hoffert, 23, and Janice Wylie, 21. The real killer turned out to be psychopathic, white Hispanic drug addict, Richard Robles.

The pro-criminal lobby has also sought to extend the “innocent-black-men-confessing” ruse by adding guilty-as-hell black males, such as the attackers of the “Central Park Jogger,” and even cold-blooded cop killer, Wesley Cook/Mumia Abu-Jamal, to their rolls of the “innocent.”

You’d think the national MSM would be running with such a bizarre crime story, but they are maintaining media silence. Forget it Jake, it’s Chinatown.

P.S. It just occurred to me that a black kid named Roland Trone tried to gouge out my eyeballs--but only one at a time--in two attacks in my hometown of Long Beach.

It's no secret that race-based affirmative action in higher education faces a crisis of legitimacy. It has been banned in California, Florida, Michigan, Washington, Arizona, and Nebraska. Even as the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of affirmative action in 2003 in Grutter v. Bollinger, the justices expressed an expectation that the policy would soon no longer be needed, practically inviting relitigation. Although the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

“This is an article for subscribers only….”

* * *

Let’s see. Affirmative action is:

1. Unconstitutional, in violating the 14th Amendment;2. Illegal, in violating the 1964 U.S. Civil Rights Act, in discriminating against people, based on race;3. A moral outrage, in its violation of fundamental notions of fairness;4. Economically destructive, in costing the American tax base trillions of dollars;5. Destructive of the public sphere, which becomes no more than a means for racially privileged incompetents to steal from the competent but racially disadvantaged;6. Destructive of the private sphere, as well, as the public sphere coerces it to adopt the same practices;7. Based on deception, as one must always lie about the qualifications of blacks and Hispanics;8. Destructive of science, in order to coerce it to cover for #7;9. Bringing about an Idiocracy, as intelligent people must conform to both continuous and changing lies demanded by stupid, racist, blacks and Hispanics, and;10. Deadly, due to other people who are variously incompetent, and/or negligent, and/or malevolent, being given responsibility over life-and-death situations (e.g., policemen, firemen, nurses, doctors).

Under the racial socialist regime of multiculturalism, there are no holidays for whites, while every day is a holiday for the diverse. All over America, every day, blacks flock to public spaces—shopping malls, subways, parks, beaches, bowling alleys, state and county fairs, stadia, restaurants, schools, streets—in order to riot, especially in order to racially terrorize whites. They have cost predominantly whites untold billions of dollars in destroyed businesses, job losses, and increased expenses for private security and public services. (And blacks then a get a disproportionate piece of the security and public service jobs, on top of getting disproportionately hired in such venues, in the first place.) Beyond the cost in dollars and cents, there is the spiritual cost: millions of white families have lost safe places where they could go to enjoy a good, wholesome, safe time.

And then, when young blacks—with the enthusiastic encouragement of black adults of all strata, from parents to politicians, have destroyed public spaces, black leaders demand more extortion money for “services” for black youth, blaming the lack of “programs” for black criminality. And as I experienced first hand, the black “activists” and “professionals” who demand racial segregation and control of such programs, which they rob blind, teach their charges to engage in more violence, and use their new power bases to threaten more riots, if they are not constantly paid more protection money.

Funny, but you don’t see poor white kids rioting, for lack of “programs,” or white parents demanding such payoffs. And the blacks who do riot, come from all economic strata.

Unfortunately, though hundreds of people with cellphone camera witnessed the anarchy at Wave Country in Nashville, Newschannel 5 did not deign to broadcast any of those images or the accompanying audio, or to mention who the malefacotrs were. Maybe some video will briefly find its way to Youtube. I ask readers to notify me, before any such videos gets censored. In any event, people of all races know how to read between the lines.

By the way, white conservatives will now respond to this story with their usual calls for black leaders to impose order on their followers. Conservatives just don’t get it. Whether here, in the Caribbean, or sub-Saharan Africa, black community leaders devote themselves to exhorting their followers to engage in savage, racist violence against whites and Asians. Unlike whites and many Asian groups, who have the gift of self-government on the both the individual and collective level, either whites externally impose civilization on blacks, or anarchy will reign.

I know, I know, not all blacks are savages. But how many “good, decent” blacks stand up to the savages? And how many supposedly “respectable,” “educated” blacks give the savages moral support and/or criminally aid and abet them? Millions of American whites don’t want to know the answers to those questions, while my readers have long known them.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Nearly two dozen police officers were called out to Wave Country on Monday afternoon after large crowds of people became unruly. The disturbance forced park managers to close the facility two hours early on Memorial Day.

Metro Parks director Tommy Lynch said Wave Country was nowhere near capacity, but there were plenty of problems that caused the park to close early.

"Once we got to the point that the turmoil at the front of the facility also got inside the facility, we felt for everyone's safety the best thing to do was to close it," Lynch explained.

Metro Police were called out to Wave Country around 1 p.m. because the crowd outside the gates and inside the park was acting up.

"That crowd refused to follow any kind of instructions. They became disorderly," according to Cpt. Marlene Pardue from Metro Police.

There were several fights inside. Police said one of the biggest problems was people jumping the fence to get into the park, creating chaos inside the park.

"Not just kids jumping the fence, but adults, with children and strollers, putting them over the fence, then jumping the fence," Cpt. Pardue said.

Visitors inside the park said the chaos made them feel unsafe.

"Hundreds of people were just jumping over the fence. Almost trampled my kids. I just didn't feel safe," Heather Nowack explained.

Park managers said this is the first time in 30 years they have had to close Wave Country because the crowd became uncontrollable.

"The heat, the crowd, the behavior. Everything just coming together at the wrong time and you just ended up with a mess here," said Cpt. Pardue.

Visitors who paid to go to Wave Country and want to be compensated for the early closing can contact Metro Parks to see if it will be possible to get passes for another trip to the park.

Monday, May 30, 2011

Saving Private Ryan Soundtrack composed by John Williams, performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Somber music for a somber movie.

John Williams is God’s gift to the movies.

When Aaron Copland (1900-1990) composed music for a movie, he would not only write stunning music, but lots of it, so that a picture like The Red Pony might contain over a solid hour of music, very little of it repeat themes. He took twice as long writing a score as the typical composer, and he demanded and got a much higher fee—and he earned every bit of it. The opening theme alone to The Red Pony is so stunning that when I saw the picture for first time last summer with my then 10-year-old son, and the opening credits cited Copland, my son said, without prompting, “Thank you, Aaron.”

Although there is a fair amount of repetition in this score, it still blows me away how many great individual themes John Williams wrote for one picture, and how powerful they are, not just the requiem. We Stix men feel the same way about seeing John Williams’ name in the credits as we do about Aaron Copland.

We loved each other tenderly,Like we loved all lovers,Then one day you left me,Ever since I've been desperate,I see you everywhere in the sky,I see you everywhere on the earth,You are my joy and my sun,My nights, my days, my clear dawns.

(CHORUS)

You are everywhere, because you are in my heart,You are everywhere, because you are my happiness,Everything that is around me,Even life does not represent you,Sometimes I dream that I am in your arms,And you speak softly in my ear,You tell me things that make me close my eyes,And I find that marvelous.

Maybe one day you will return,I know that my heart waits for you,You cannot forget,The past days we spent together,My eyes never stop searching for you,Listen well, my heart calls you,We can love each other again,And you’ll see life would be beautiful.

Long before the late Harve Presnell (1933-2009) was a big, bald, old character actor who played commanding SOBs in movies like Fargo and Saving Private Ryan, he was a blandly handsome, young musical performer with a full head of blonde hair, and a golden pair of pipes. Unfortunately for him, he hit Hollywood as the movie musical was in its death throes. But he was a trouper, and so he did every sort of musical work that was still available, as a replacement performer in Broadway shows, and in touring companies, and eventually worked his way back into pictures as a straight dramatic actor. He died of pancreatic cancer two years ago, at the age of 75.

Sunday, May 29, 2011

“Das Geheimnis Pattons ist die Vergangenheit,” says a captain in the German high command. “Patton’s secret is the past.” The secret of the man and the movie.

The moment Patton opens, you know this will be like no other war movie. General George S. Patton Jr. (1885-1945) stands before the biggest American flag I have ever seen, wearing a highly buffed, black helmet and a uniform suggesting the 18th or 19th century, weighed down with medals domestic and foreign, bearing not one but two ivory-handled revolvers, and holding a riding crop. As a bugler plays reveille, the camera focuses on each feature in turn. And then Scott lets loose with the now famous monologue, which was actually the last thing the filmmakers came up with.

“Now I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country...!”

Atten ... tion!

Consider the time. It was 1970; America was mired in a highly unpopular war in Vietnam, the draft had just been ended, and America was preparing to pull out its fighting men from the first military defeat in its history. And here was this spirit from the past, saying, “Americans love to fight,” and “will not tolerate a loser”!

Early in Patton, we hear the sound of distant trumpets, as in 1943, the general surveys the ancient battlefield where Carthage (modern name, Tunis, in Tunisia) was burnt to the ground by the Romans in 146 B.C.

Patton is standing near the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia, where over 1,000 American G.I.s had just been butchered in their first encounter with the German Wehrmacht, in the form of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s Afrika Korps. “I was there,” he tells his assistant. In 146 B.C.

Is he mad or is he teasing? The answer is, a little of both.

He quotes part of a lush, romantic poem of the eternal warrior—he is the poet. An American poet-general? Clearly, we are dealing with a man singular in the annals of 20th century American warfare. “I hate the 20th century,” the old “cavalry horse officer” remarks.

Through the travail of the ages,
Midst the pomp and toil of war,
Have I fought and strove and perished,
Countless times upon this star.

In the form of many people,
In all panoplies of time,
Have I seen the luring vision,
Of the Victory Maid, sublime.

I have battled for fresh mammoth,
I have warred for pastures new,
I have listed [listened?] to the whispers,
When the race trek instinct grew.

I have known the call to battle,
In each changeless changing shape,
From the high souled voice of conscience,
To the beastly lust for rape.

I have sinned and I have suffered,
Played the hero and the knave,
Fought for belly, shame, or country,
And for each have found a grave.

I cannot name my battles,
For the visions are not clear,
Yet, I see the twisted faces,
And I feel the rending spear.

Perhaps I stabbed our Savior,
In His sacred helpless side,
Yet, I’ve called His name in blessing,
When after times I died.

In the dimness of the shadows,
Where we hairy heathens warred,
I can taste in thought the lifeblood,
We used teeth before the sword.

While in later clearer vision,
I can sense the coppery sweat,
Feel the pikes grow wet and slippery,
When our Phalanx, Cyrus met.

Hear the rattle of the harness,
Where the Persian darts bounced clear,
See their chariots wheel in panic,
From the Hoplite’s leveled spear.

See the goal grow monthly longer,
Reaching for the walls of Tyre,
Hear the crash of tons of granite,
Smell the quenchless eastern fire.

Still more clearly as a Roman,
Can I see the Legion close,
As our third rank moved in forward,
And the short sword found our foes.

Once again I feel the anguish,
Of that blistering treeless plain,
When the Parthian showered death bolts,
And our discipline was in vain.

I remember all the suffering,
Of those arrows in my neck,
Yet, I stabbed a grinning savage,
As I died upon my back.

Once again I smell the heat sparks,
When my Flemish plate gave way,
And the lance ripped through my entrails,
As on Crecy’s field I lay.

In the windless, blinding stillness,
Of the glittering tropic sea,
I can see the bubbles rising,
Where we set the captives free.

Midst the spume of half a tempest,
I have heard the bulwarks go,
When the crashing, point blank round shot,
Sent destruction to our foe.

I have fought with gun and cutlass,
On the red and slippery deck,
With all Hell aflame within me,
And a rope around my neck.

And still later as a General,
Have I galloped with Murat,
When we laughed at death and numbers,
Trusting in the Emperor’s Star.

Till at last our star faded,
And we shouted to our doom,
Where the sunken road of Ohein,
Closed us in its quivering gloom.

So but now with tanks a’clatter,
Have I waddled on the foe,
Belching death at twenty paces,
By the star shell’s ghastly glow.

So as through a glass, and darkly,
The age long strife I see,
Where I fought in many guises,
Many names, but always me.

And I see not in my blindness,
What the objects were I wrought,
But as God rules o’er our bickering,
It was through His will I fought.

So forever in the future,
Shall I battle as of yore,
Dying to be born a fighter,
But to die again, once more.

(Note the similarities in Mick Jagger’s lyrics to “Sympathy for the Devil.” In the movie, Scott quotes only the poem’s highlights.)

Patton refers to himself as “a prima donna,” but as director Franklin Schaffner, scenarists Francis Ford Coppola (yes, before he became Hollywood’s greatest active director, he was its greatest active screenwriter!) and Edmund H. North, and star George C. Scott portray him, megalomaniac is more like it. Before going in to battle, as he stands before his mirror, his Negro soldier-valet carefully placing his begoggled helmet on his head, he more closely resembles a Roman general (or Il Duce) than a modern officer. And in a notorious, true incident, upon encountering a shell-shocked soldier, he slaps the man silly, threatens to shoot him, and is almost cashiered by Ike. But he was our greatest 20th century field commander.

The making of Patton clearly influenced Coppola, when the latter made Apocalypse Now. At one point on a battlefield, Patton smells the smoke of spent gunpowder and says, “I love it, God help me, I do love it. I love it more than my life.” This scene clearly anticipates the scene in Apocalypse Now, where Robert Duvall’s Lt. Col. Kilgore famously says, “I love the smell of napalm in the morning. It smells like ... victory.”

In Patton’s brutality, his talk of never giving up an inch of land (Hitler said the very same thing.), in his contempt for civilian authority, in his joy at killing, he comes across as a fascist or Nazi, which is how he was depicted at the time by journalists and newspaper caricaturists. Amazingly, the movie is able to glorify this man, while maintaining a posture of cold sentimentality towards him. Schaffner loves Patton, but without illusions. Patton wasn’t “larger than life” – no man is – he was life, or at least the martial, intellectual, and aesthetic lives, in all their fullness.

General George S. Patton Jr. had a sense of destiny; his purpose in life was to do great things on the field of battle. And as he observes, only once in a thousand years do the heavens so align that a soldier has such an opportunity to change history.

Fortunately, in the movie as in life, Patton had humble, ordinary Joe—at least as Bradley tells it—Gen. Omar Bradley (the last five-star, General of the Army, in the history of the U.S. Army) as a counterweight. Bradley is played by Karl Malden with a restraint and self-effacing humor that perfectly contrast Patton/Scott’s bravado.

Jerry Goldsmith’s score has just the right blend of the elegiac (distant trumpets) and the pompous yet playful (fanfare of horns and flutes), corresponding to the tempers of Patton’s personality.

While almost three hours long, Patton does not flag, and could easily have been longer. Some of its early battle scenes, while competently choreographed, seem to have been filmed with an insufficient complement of armor and extras. And in one early scene, the line of Scott’s makeup, giving him Patton’s receding hairline, shows.

The DVD has a lovely documentary on the making of Patton, as well as Jerry Goldsmith’s rousing score. However, I do not believe the claim of the movie’s late director, Franklin Schaffner, that he did not make Patton in response to the anti-war movement. Producer Frank McCarthy was a retired general, and many generals felt that the media lost Vietnam for us. And the media is depicted in despicable terms—if Patton wanted to be sure something leaked out, all he had to do was say it was “off the record”—and one reporter is shown personally insulting him.

Patton: “For over a thousand years, Roman conquerors returning from the wars enjoyed the honor of a triumph—a tumultuous parade.... A slave stood behind the conqueror, holding a golden crown, and whispering in his ear a warning: that all glory is fleeting.”

Just as Patton could not savor his success, so too George C. Scott, the rare actor who could carry a film on his shoulders, was unable to build on his success as Patton. After a series of brilliant performances culminated in his well-deserved Oscar for Patton, Scott, a violent drunk, went downhill until his death in 1999. He still got steady work, but the work was largely undistinguished. But for one moment, he tasted of that perfection that comes when the stars align, and a great role is delivered into the hands of just the right actor at just the right moment in his career. It was George C. Scott’s destiny to play Patton.

The Department of Veterans Affairs cannot bar a Houston pastor from invoking Jesus Christ in a Memorial Day prayer, a federal judge ruled in a case that is yet another illustration of anti-Christian animus in the country.

U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes told the department it was “forbidden from dictating the content of speeches – whether those speeches are denominated prayers or otherwise – at
the Memorial Day ceremony of National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston.”

“The government cannot gag citizens when it says it is in the interest of national security, and it cannot do it in some bureaucrat’s notion of cultural homogeneity,” the judge wrote. “The right of free expression ranges from the dignity of Abraham Lincoln’s speeches to Charlie Sheen’s rants.”

In his order, the judge noted that the Rev. Scott Rainey, the lead pastor of the Living Word Church of the Nazarene, was likely to prevail on his claims should the case reach trial.

“The Constitution does not confide to the government the authority to compel emptiness in a prayer, where a prayer belongs,” he said. “The gray mandarins of the national government are decreeing how citizens honor their veterans. This is not a pick-up-your-trash sign; this is a we-pick-your-words sign.”

The case was brought on Rainey’s behalf by Texas’ Liberty Institute, a non-profit devoted to protecting freedoms and strengthening families.

Liberty Institute General Counsel Jeff Mateer did not know what prompted the government to step into the matter, adding he was told by another minister that the Memorial Day prayers have been going on for over 20 years with the mention of Jesus without incident. Why it occurred with likely remain a mystery as the government conceded the issue at a Friday hearing.

“There certainly is a climate in our country that precipitates these types of actions,” Mateer said. “Secularists and separationists are trying to push an agenda that is telling government that you can’t have any religion in public.”

Rainey had given the Memorial Day invocation at the cemetery for the past two years and in each case mentioned Jesus Christ without incident.

The event at the public Houston National Cemetery is run by a private group, the National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston. This year, the director of the council, Arleen Ocasio, asked Rainey to submit his prayer for review. He sent a draft to Ocasio.

The seven-paragraph prayer spent the first five speaking of God in a non-denominational way, invoking “almighty God” and including the words, “We pray for peace among nations around the world. We pray for peace in the homes of families who have lost loved ones in these great battles. We pray for peace in the heart of every person present today as we seek you with our whole heart.”

The prayer closed with a recitation of the Lord’s Prayer and the line, “While respecting people of every faith today, it is in the name of Jesus Christ, the risen Lord, that I pray. Amen.”

Ocasio said that Rainey would not be allowed to pray unless he removed references to one religion. Rainey appealed to the general counsel of the Department of Veterans Affairs. Deputy General Counsel John Thompson sided with Ocasio, telling the pastor “the ceremony will commemorate veterans of all cultures and beliefs, and the tone of remarks must therefore be inclusive.”

"I am very disappointed that the Houston National Cemetery would take such an anti-freedom stance,” Rainey said upon filing suit. “This is my third year to be invited to deliver the invocation, and I have never been asked to edit the content of my prayer. While I consider it an honor to lead such a somber gathering in prayer, I will not forsake my religious beliefs.”

The suit sought a temporary restraining order that would allow the prayer as written. The judge on Thursday granted the request.

"While I am very disappointed we had to take legal action, I am glad that the judge agreed that removing Jesus’ name from my prayer is unconstitutional,” Rainey said. “I am honored to be allowed to pray in the name of Jesus at this somber remembrance of our nation’s fallen.”

* * *

Two notes on the above: It was a private organization, the National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston, that had initially barred the Rev. Rainey from invoking Jesus as the Christ in his prayer. The Department of Veterans Affairs then stepped in, on the private group’s behalf. Had the VA kept out of it, the NCCGH might have prevailed in court. I say this, based on the previous litigation surrounding the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade, in which homosexual activists sued to force the parade’s sponsor, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, to permit homosexuals to march under their own banner, in the traditional Catholic parade. (Homosexuals were already permitted to march, but only as members of non-homosexual groups, in which they marched as members of those groups, rather than identified as homosexuals.)

(Note that the homosexuals suing to force their way into the parade hated Catholicism, and were the same people who had notoriously trespassed in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, committed vandalism, and stomped on the host. In an earlier, better time, had the gay Nazis tried the same thing, they would have been physically thrown out of the cathedral, beaten to a pulp by an interdenominational crowd outside, while the cops took a cigarette break and watched, and the whole city cheered. Then again, in an earlier, better time, homosexuals wouldn’t have dared trespass in a church.)

The judge ruled in favor of the AOH because it was a private group, and not a government agency. Had the city sought to enforce the AOH’s will, the ruling might have gone the other way. The AOH may have been saved by the city’s pro-homosexual advocacy. (And in an earlier, better time, no homosexual would have dared launch such a vicious lawsuit.)

Private groups do not have to respect dissenters’ First Amendment rights; the government does. In practice, however, the government only respects the First Amendment rights of anti-Christians.

The other matter of note regards the motivation and justification for the lawsuit by the Rev. Rainey, who said, "I am very disappointed that the Houston National Cemetery would take such an anti-freedom stance.”

He didn’t really mean that. The good Reverend is not lead pastor of the Living Word Church of Freedom. He does not worship Ayn Rand, or the dollar bill, but Jesus. Thus, his real complaint was that the Houston National Cemetery would take such an anti-Christian stance, and I would not haver held it against him, had he said so, but talk of “freedom” is the way one must couch one’s Christian complaints in a constitutional context… these days. ‘Twasn’t always so, but when it wasn’t so, no power, private or public, would have sought to muzzle him.

Had the Rev. Rainey instead been a Moslem imam looking to say “Allahu Akbar” in a Memorial Day prayer, I am sure that the NCCGH and the VA would have celebrated his “right” to do so.

Saturday, May 28, 2011

When the Mets traded for him, in a blockbuster deal following the 1984 season, Gary Carter, then 30, was the final piece of the puzzle. Twenty-seven years later, his very existence is a puzzle.

Carter, who with teammate Keith Hernandez led the Mets to a World Series championship in 1986, learned from doctors this week that they are “90 percent certain” that the tumors found in his brain are malignant.

Doctors at Duke Medical Center told the 57-year-old Carter that they are "90 percent certain" the tumors are malignant, according to a report on the New York Daily News website.

"It was very hard for all of us to hear, as we have been hoping and praying that the tumors would be benign," one of Carter's daughters wrote on the family's website. "Lots of tears have been shed in the hospital room today, and we are all a bit scared of the unknown."…According to the website, the plan is for Carter to begin chemotherapy and radiation.

From the mid-1970s until the late 1980s, Carter was the dominant catcher in the National League. He played most of his prime years with the Montreal Expos, but never got to play in a World Series until the Expos traded him to New York. He was enshrined in Baseball’s Hall of Fame in Cooperstown in 2003.

Friday, May 27, 2011

Simple soul that I am, I thought that being an adherent of genocidal Black Liberation Theology; being devoted to the destruction of America; being simultaneously the citizen of at least three different nations (Kenya, Indonesia, and the U.S.); and being born as, being raised for several years as, and counting still as a Moslem under Islamic law; might call into question the Americanness of the John Doe calling himself “Barack (Hussein) Obama.” But no, that would be too easy, according to the great minds at the WSJ. It is, rather, “Obama’s” lack of loyalty to Israel which marks him as un-American!

…Obama's detachment from the Jewish state is of a piece with this evident detachment from his own country.

To be sure, not all Americans feel this kindredness with Israel. Some see it as just another country, the way Obama seems to; others, like Helen Thomas, seethe with a hatred for the Jewish state that boils over into outright anti-Semitism. In between are people who, while not anti-Semitic and perhaps not quite antipathetic to Israel per se, are jealous of it for its claim on American affection. That is the emotion behind the oft-heard claim of “dual loyalty”--a charge that is absurd in light of Mead's insight “that Israel is an American value.”

Disesteem for Israel is rare in America, but it is concentrated in certain cultural pockets, the most notable of which is the academic left. Some of our friends on the right imagine that Obama is a secret jihadist or a hater like his erstwhile pastor. To put it charitably, we think this overexplains matters. The trouble with the president is simply that he spent too much time in the faculty lounge.

Actually, hostility ("disesteem"?!) towards Israel is widespread among approximately 40 million blacks, 50 million or so Hispanics, and six million or so Moslems—over 30 percent of the nation’s “residents”—and spreading like a wild fire, via mass Third World immigration.

And while he was an adjunct lecturer and senior lecturer on constitutional law at the University of Chicago, “Obama” was never an academic. He did not hang around “the faculty lounge,” and (unlike yours truly) never published a single scholarly article, not even a ghost-written one. But the WSJ blogger’s thought processes are so tortuous and dishonest that he qualifies to be a tenured professor!

Reader Anonymous is either the most active commenter on my blog, or shares the same name as the majority of my commenters. I am reprinting his comment in its entirety, including typos, with my responses within brackets.

Anon: You might get more comments on your posts if you weren't so blatantly racist.[Leaving aside the issue of whether my writing is “racist,” “blatantly” or otherwise, your statement raises an empirical question whose answer neither of us knows. But why write on a topic on a blog, where I'm not getting paid anyway, if I'm not going to be honest about it? I could understand your advising me to lie, if it meant turning a dollar, but you're advising me to lie for nothing?!]

I found your page when I googled unreported violent crime in NYC, and your name came up. I don't care if it's primarily black and Hispanics who are committing violent crime. Just go after all violent criminals regardless of race, lock them and report the crimes accurately. [But when I report the crimes accurately, you get mad at me, call me mean names, and hurt my tender feelings. I think you need to make up your mind just what it is you want.] I don't want to turn it into a race issue. [But it is a race issue, regardless of what you want.] Let's just clean up the crime. [But we can’t because that would require massive arrests and draconian sentencing of the people committing 90 percent or more of the crime in many American cities, who just so happen to be black and Hispanic, and who scream “Racism!” whenever the police try to do their job.] Race just makes the waters murky, and often makes otherwise logical comments seem ridiculous. [Speaking of race clarifies matters. Without talking about race, it is impossible to accurately understand crime in America. People would be misled by fraudulent journalists and academics into thinking that the majority of the savage crimes we hear about daily across the country are being carried out by whites, when they are overwhelmingly being carried out by blacks and Hispanics. And what are the “otherwise logical comments” made to “seem ridiculous” by citing the role of race?] The race issue made obscured the real issue, which is underreported violent crime. [The race issue is the real issue. The authorities are underreporting violent crime, because of who is committing it. They and the media are also simultaneously over-reporting crimes, based on the race of the assailants: Not only do the media give saturation coverage to rare gruesome crimes committed by whites, especially almost non-existent white-on-black, or white-on-Hispanic crime, but the feds routinely lie, in counting Hispanic-on-black “hate crimes” as having been committed by “whites,” in order to inflate white crime and white “hate crime” figures.] I'm not saying vital statistic of the crimes shouldn't be part of the public record (sure make public race, age, sex, etc., of both perp an victim), it just shouldn't be a focal point. [But it is the focal point. Millions of times per year, blacks and Hispanics target whites, because the latter are white.] Why? Because the inevitable truth is that most often it's whites who hurt whites, and blacks who hurt blacks. Criminals tend to victimize those in their own communities. [You’re wrong on the facts. Black criminals tend to leave their communities, in order to victimize whites. Even according to the feds’ doctored stats, every year since at least 1987, black criminals have victimized whites more than they have other blacks. How do you account for that? You can’t. You ordered me to cease and desist from stating the facts, but your refusal to confront them led you to make false factual statements. In a related matter, people argue on behalf of open borders by lying about the extent of Hispanic crime. How will maintaining false beliefs, and condemning those who speak the truth help solve our crime problems?]

Most Americans just want the whole race issue to go away. We don't want people pulling race cards. We don't want people using race as a defense. We don't want people using race as an excuse for affirmative action, etc.. We just want the entire race issue to go away.

[Anon, I can’t make it go away. I can only tell the truth about it… or lie. I can’t even ignore it, because public discourse is dominated by people who make everything racial, and who compulsively lie about race. They demand that one either agree with them, or oppose them, in which case they destroy one.]

Years ago, when I was in college, I spent a lot of time and energy convincing my minority friends that most whites we're [?] racist. I didn't witness it in my family, and I shouldn't be made to pay the price for racism that existed before me. Then I see commentators like you who keep perpetuating the divisiveness. You're just making things harder on the rest of us.

Please make it stop. THURSDAY, MAY 26, 2011 5:04:00 PM EDT

[Anon, I am not “perpetuating the divisiveness,” whatever that means. I am not the one causing innocent whites to be targeted by blacks and Hispanics based on the color of their skin, and beaten, robbed, kidnapped, raped, tortured, maimed and murdered, or arrested and even imprisoned on false charges. And it is going to get worse and worse. Maybe you’re one of the lucky ones, and can get away with sticking your head in the sand, without causing horrific consequences to yourself, your family, or friends. However, millions of whites are going to find themselves dragged, kicking and screaming, away from their holes, and in many cases, as with four of the victims of the Pearcy Massacre, it will take their dental records to identify them. You do know what the Pearcy Massacre was, don’t you?

I can’t “make it stop.” Blacks have been waging a race war on whites for 50-57 years, and Hispanics have been doing the same for over 40 years.

How am I “perpetuating the divisiveness,” and “just making things harder on the rest of us”? Are you saying that whites complaining about black and Hispanic crime are responsible for black and Hispanic crime? Do you understand the concept of logical circularity? Of chronological order? Causality? Moral agency? Shooting the messenger?

You’re not as ignorant as you let on. Your rhetoric stinks of bargaining behavior, Stockholm Syndrome, and scapegoating.

If I die a horrible death, it won’t be through living in denial or lying.

If you want to see where this country is headed, read about the ongoing genocide blacks are conducting against whites in South Africa at Sarah, Maid of Albion.

By the way, do you know of any historical cases in which silence on the part of a targeted victim group in the face of coming genocide saved the group?

Defense attorney Peter Morreale told jurors that Sykes believed his three co-defendants were plotting to kill him because they thought he was cooperating with prosecutors. The stress of that threat, along with the fact that he is facing the possibility of the death penalty, pushed him over the edge mentally, Morreale suggested.

Well, if he were insane, would he be frightened of death?

It has been nearly three years since the crime, which is being called the “French Valley Slayings.” None of the four suspects have been tried for the murders. As far as I can determine, only two news outlets are covering the current proceeding.

It has become painfully evident to me that I have been ignoring Max Steiner, whom some movie lovers consider the greatest of all composers for the silver screen, and who certainly was one of a handful of the greatest.

Thanks to Lordhelmchen76, for yet another tasteful, comprehensive upload that does justice to the composer.

HOUSTON - No more “getting away with murder” in the Lone Star State: that’s the message from the Texas Legislature.

The state Senate passed a bill on Wednesday - one previously approved by the House - that would take probation off the table for defendants convicted of first degree murder.

The result: automatic prison time. No probation.

This change in the law was inspired by the case of Steven Hardin, a wrecker driver shot dead by the man whose truck he was towing from a disputed parking spot.

The killer, Barry Crawford, was found guilty. But the jury punished him with ten years’ deferred adjudication, which is a form of probation.

To Hardin’s mother, that was a miscarriage of justice.

And for 13 years, she has pushed for this change, saying it’s what Steven would have wanted.

“There's been times that I wanted to just throw up my hands and quit,” says Carolyn Hardin. “And I'd feel that little nudge: ‘Mama, you're not a quitter.’”

If the bill is signed into law by the Governor, it will take effect September 1.

The law is not retroactive, however. It will only apply to murders committed on or after that date.

* * *

Unfortunately, this law, as described by Hibberd, does not appear to be any sort of solution. It only applies to first-degree murder, thus letting off anyone convicted of second-degree murder or manslaughter, from the get-go. And on top of that, in the spirit of the times, in which blacks and Hispanics—who commit the overwhelming majority of murders, and not just in Harris County—are routinely undercharged and underpunished, Texas authorities can in practice nullify the law simply by charging black and Hispanic killers guilty of first-degree murder with second-degree murder. Thus, the new Texas law, if enacted, is nothing but PR.

My original headline was “In Harris County, Texas, Over 100 Convicted Murderers Have Received Only Probation,” but then I realized that that was inaccurate. Many murderers are convicted only of manslaughter or even less than that.

The Obama White House has hired a man named Jesse Lee to be its new Director of Progressive Media & Online Response. His sole function will be to provide rapid response to negative stories about the administration.

Republican pundit Michael Reagan considers it “unconscionable” that this new position, a traditional campaign job paid for by the incumbent’s Party national committee, would be placed in the White House, and the taxpayers bilked to pay for it, but that since having Osama bin Laden assassinated, “Obama” is feeling omnipotent.

That was definitely a hate crime but we can bet the farm that it won't be treated as such just as the murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom weren't nor were the murders of the four young people in Wichita nor the murders of Eve Carson and Anne Pressley. It goes on and on and we pretend not to notice the trend.

Frank9:33am on Saturday, May 21, 2011

It's not clear that you understand the term "hate crime". It's more than just having a suspect and a victim of different races. And citing two other cases that do not fit the definition of "hate crime" either (except in the right wing echo chamber) does not validate your claim. This is Bethesda, please take your ignorant talking points elsewhere.

* * *

[N.S.: I posted the following response at Patch Bethesda.]

1:03am on Thursday, May 26, 2011

How do you know that Pelayo doesn’t “understand the term ‘hate crime,’” Frank? Pelayo cited four different cases in which young whites were targeted and horribly murdered by blacks, based solely on the color of their skin. The only way you could deny that they were hate crimes is if you played word games such that no atrocity committed by a black against a white ever counted as a hate crime. Otherwise, you’re lost.

And which two of the four cases Pelayo cited, pray tell, were hate crimes? You have no bloody idea what Pelayo or I am talking about, because you’ve never read about the cases. You think he cited only “two other cases”!

And what about the Kirkwood Massacre? Or the Winchester Atrocity? How about the Pearcy Massacre? Duh? You have no blessed idea what I’m talking about.

You have devoted no time to studying these cases, yet you have the unmitigated gall to tell people who have that they are “ignorant.” You have nothing but racism, ignorance, and arrogance.

“Today, Oakland is considered the 5th most violent city in the United States.

“Will it soon become the most violent?”

I find that question underwhelming. The competition for the title of “Most Violent City in America” is incredibly fierce. Ya gotta represent. No one is standing in place. Does the writer conceive of the sort of concerted, collective effort required to climb four rungs on the ladder? The poor felons would have to work double and triple shifts wreaking havoc.

If anything, Oakland is more likely to drop in the rankings. All over America for approximately 20 years, the “best-managed” police departments have been those which perfected the method of “disappearing” urban crime. Oakland is due, under the circumstances, to become the national leader in the field. We may soon start hearing of how the city about which, in its Golden Age, Gertrude Stein wrote, “There isn't any ‘there’ there,” has become surprisingly “livable.”

The writer also has his causality backwards. He claims that in cities like Detroit and Camden, industry left, and “the void” was filled by gangs. In virtually all once prosperous American diversitopias, you will find that criminal blacks and/or Hispanics moved in, took over, and violently chased the whites and businesses out. As The Color of Crime (2005) shows, crime causes poverty.

I do agree, however, with the author’s judgment that the claims by politicians that things are getting better are transparent lies, and America’s economy is actually in a death spiral.

The Washington Post caption to this picture reads, “Diana Nyad, at age 61, prepares for second attempt to swim from Cuba to Key West,” but a better one would have been: At 61, Diana Nyad looks like a member of the 1970-80’s East German Women’s Olympic Swim Team. [See update at bottom!]

Swimming with sharks at age 61: Legendary long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad is ready to make the trek again from Cuba to Key West, and this time finish.

By Sally Jenkins, Published: May 25

A couple of years ago, swimming legend Diana Nyad was emceeing a swank awards banquet in the Waldorf Astoria ballroom in New York when she suddenly woke up the crowd by stripping off her dress. Standing on stage in nothing but a swimsuit and high heels, dangling her cleavage, she further enlivened the affair by whipping out a bugle and playing reveille.

She was nearing 60 then. Now she’s 61, and just the other day she made a Hamptons cocktail party come alive by popping a bicep, to prove she’s still capable of swimming from Cuba to Florida. She rolled up her sleeve and flexed a muscle the size of a small cannonball. Conversation stopped, replaced by sharp intakes of breath, followed by upset glasses of wine and fumbled cheese wedges.

Some time in June or July, when the weather permits, Nyad will attempt a 103-mile swim from Cuba to Key West through the shark-infested waters of the Florida Straits. This will be no mere party stunt to show off her physique — think of Helen Mirren with brawn. Nyad intends to challenge the limits of the mind and calendar by finishing a job she started 32 years ago, when she was the greatest endurance swimmer in the world….

Update: 3:04 a.m., on Thursday, May 26, 2011: Until a few minutes ago, the Washington Post article listed 19 comments. However, when I hit the link, I got "Page Not Found," and the article now claims that it has "0" comments. My hunch is that some readers commented on Nyad's mannish appearance, and/or questioned her sexuality, and/or questioned her ability to come up with some clean urine, and the Post's censors responded by deleting the entire thread.

''Herman Cain is the Black Ronald Reagan of our time…. Imagine if Obama's opponent was a black Reagan. It blows the race issue away, creates for once a truly positive role model for black youth and I see no down side as of today….''

'Real diversity.' The 'real big tent party.' This is what it has come to.

''Herman Cain will drive the libtards nuts, especially those at the Lame Stream Media outlets. They lose their Ace in the Hole, RACISM! What the hell will they have to talk about? Mr. Cain can slam dunk everyone of the clunkers policies and walk away unscathed. He is hugely loved in Fly Over USA!! YES WE CAIN!!!!''

Yes we Cain? No, we cain't.

The last commenter above shows how little has been learned after seeing every 'conservative black' on the GOP side be called 'Uncle Toms' or 'Aunt Jemima', like Condi Rice. The race card has been played against Clarence Thomas and every other black 'conservative' paragon they wheel out. Black conservatives will not nullify the race card, as these Republicans keep saying. And even if they could, what would that imply? That we ourselves can't speak for ourselves, we must have blacks to intercede for us with the gods of Political Correctness?...

The fact that Cain is gaining so much momentum is worrying, because what will our choices be in the next election? A choice between black candidate A and black candidate B….

I've said before, back in 2008, that electing a black president would be crossing a bridge, and it would establish a precedent that would then become the new norm, the default. A White nominee, from now on, will be at a decided disadvantage. Pale, male, and stale, as our foes put it. Now in our new and improved non-racist America, a black and/or female must henceforth be the only viable candidates. Anything else will be the fabled ''big step backward'' and 'proof that ugly racism still thrives in America'' and all the rest of it….

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

On February 1, Canadian-born actor John Vernon died at the age of 72, of complications following heart surgery.

Vernon, born Adolphus Raymondus Vernon Agopsowicz, was famous for playing authority figures who tended to be hypocritical, pompous asses. Such casting owed much to Vernon’s broad-shouldered, 6’2” frame, booming baritone, and lack of leading man looks. The movies most frequently mentioned by obit writers were Clint Eastwood’s serial killer cop story, Dirty Harry (1971; directed by Don Siegel), and the National Lampoon farce, Animal House (1978; directed by John Landis of The Twilight Zone: The Movie notoriety).

In Dirty Harry, Vernon played the pompous, hypocritical mayor, who is worried more about impressions and criminals’ rights than about getting the bad guy; in Animal House, he played the mean college Dean Wormer, who is looking to run the fun-loving frat boys of Delta House (John Belushi, et al.) off of campus.

To my knowledge, no one noted that the two roles were antipodes. “The Mayor” in Dirty Harry is a weakling who shies away from doing what is necessary, while Dean Wormer (described at imdb.com as “sinister”) is just the sort of no-nonsense tough guy that colleges have lacked for the past forty years.

Despite auspicious beginnings and a busy career on stage, screen, and TV, during the last fifteen or so years of Vernon’s career, when he did work, it was often doing voice work in cartoons or in movies so obscure (and presumably so bad), such as 1988’s Dixie Lanes and Deadly Stranger, that I never so much as heard of them. A few weeks before Vernon died, however, I got to see the sort of dramatic power he possessed. For some time (until today; I don’t know whether the programming has been ended) the Hallmark Channel devoted its Saturday afternoon programming to airing TV westerns from the late 1950s through the early 1970s, including Rawhide (1959-65), The Virginian (1962-71), and The High Chapparal (1967-71).

In an episode of The High Chaparral that first aired on January 17, 1969, entitled “No Irish Need Apply,” Vernon gave a tour de force performance as heroic but bullheaded Irish miner Sean McLaren, who leads an increasingly violent strike against a murderous, crooked, mine owner.

Vernon’s overpowering performance deserved, at the very least, an Emmy nomination. But he never had a chance. Although westerns like Gunsmoke (1955-75), Bonanza (1959-73), and The Virginian, if no longer dominant, were still popular, and The High Chaparral had graced the cover of TV Guide, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences’ powers that be rarely nominated performers from westerns. In a twenty-year run that, for instance, made Gunsmoke the most successful prime-time series of all time, the show was only nominated for six Emmys, winning but two.

And so, in the Emmy categories for which Vernon qualified, “Outstanding Single Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role” and “Outstanding Single Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role,” only three and four (of a possible five) actors were nominated, respectively. The Academy left nominations vacant! In the supporting role category, no one was awarded an Emmy, and in the lead category, the award went to Paul Scofield for Male of the Species.

John Vernon never won any awards or achieved immortality. And yet in his day, his face was instantly recognizable to millions of moviegoers and TV viewers, even if they couldn’t tell you his name, and he managed to handsomely support a wife (though they eventually divorced) and three children, two accomplishments which put him way ahead of 99 percent of America’s actors.

The Outlaw Josey Wales: Final Scene

John Vernon as “Fletcher”; Clint Eastwood as “Mr. Wilson” (the Outlaw Josey Wales).

Fletcher was Josey Wales’ Confederate commanding officer during the Civil War, but at war’s end, Fletcher betrayed his old comrades, and became part of a group of paid Federal Army killers hunting them down and slaughtering them, one by one, in competition with bounty hunters. They murdered Josey’s wife and children, and Josey became a notorious outlaw with a price on his head. At the end of the picture, after Josey has killed all of his original nemeses, save for Fletcher, the latter finds him in a ghost town saloon. The other patrons, who know Wales, warn him by addressing him as “Mr. Wilson.”

It’s Round Two of the never-ending Knoxville Horror case, as the five assailants and accomplices so far convicted in the carjacking, kidnapping, robbery, gang-rape, torture and murders of white couple Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom seek to appeal their convictions. (At least two rapist-murderers have yet to be caught.)

Back in March, Judge Blackwood set a September 8 date for the appeal hearing for Lemaricus Davidson, Cobbins’ half-brother and the ringleader in the crime. In 2009, Davidson was sentenced to death. Under Tennessee law, any convict sentenced to death gets an automatic appeal.

Judge Blackwood set the appeal hearing for Vanessa Coleman, who was Cobbins’ girlfriend at the time of the crime, and who was acquitted of the major charges, and instead convicted of facilitation in the rapes and murders and sentenced to 53 years in prison last August, for December 1.

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

It just happened for the umpteenth time in the past three or so months. I typed in search terms at Google and hit “enter,” only to fail to get what I’m looking for, because Google changed my search terms on me.

Where on earth would Google’s Web crawler or bot get the idea to substitute a search term that leads to nothing? I can understand when it responds to keywords with suggestions, based on the popularity of certain keyword combinations, but even then, there is a difference between suggesting an alternative and imposing it. But imposing an alternative search that returns no documents?

Other times, Google will substitute my own narrow search of a name within quotation marks with the same name, plus some phrase or set or phrases, without the quotation marks removed. The change results in my getting a zillion worthless hits. If I wanted to maximize the worthless hits I got, rather than find a particular article about a particular person, place, thing, or incident, I would have done as Google had.

About the same time that the folks at Google started messing with search terms, for reasons known only to them, they began changing users’ upper-case spelling in searches to lower-case, when giving results.

About 11 years ago, when I started using it, Google was an incredible tool. I would almost always find what I was looking for, in microseconds. After a few years, however, I started having problems finding articles that I’d previously found, or knew existed. Some articles had been removed by their publishers, and contrary to a myth spread far and wide on the ‘Net by “experts,” Google caches have very limited lives. Sometimes, they disappear immediately, as in the time that the Seattle school district was caught imposing racist official policies against whites. As soon as the district pulled the offending (and illegal) Web page, its cache also disappeared from Google. I was convinced then and still am that the only explanation was that someone from the school district asked someone at Google to remove the cache, and the latter intervened on the racist “educators’” behalf.

Other articles were pulled back behind pay walls, but that still doesn’t explain not getting any results for them. I frequently come across articles that are behind pay walls and require payment, in order to read them, but their publishers don’t make them invisible to the Internet. After all, how would the publishers make any money off selling articles, if no one could find them via search engines?

This bizarre behavior by Google had caused me to have to double and even triple the number of keystrokes I have to type, in order to find the results I seek. This not only wastes precious time, but is not good for one’s fingers and wrists. The only explanation that comes to mind is that Google’s programmers are seeking to increase the number of searches people have to make, in order to inflate the firm’s stats, in setting its ad rates.

NEWARK, N.J. — The third of six defendants in a Newark, N.J., schoolyard triple murder has been sentenced to more than 200 years in prison.

Alexander Alfaro was 16 at the time of the 2007 schoolyard killings that shocked New Jersey’s largest city and led to anti-crime reforms. He was convicted last month.

The slain victims — Terrance Aeriel, Dashon Harvey and Iofemi (eye-OH’-feh-mee) Hightower — were attending or about to attend Delaware State University. A fourth friend survived the attack.

Two other defendants are serving consecutive life sentences for the murders. Three defendants are awaiting possible trial dates.

Alfaro received 60 years each on two of the murders and 75 years on the third murder, to run consecutively. He also was sentenced to a consecutive term of 17 years for armed robbery.

* * *

Aren’t those bisexual glasses a darling touch? Defense attorneys routinely do that with their most murderous, psychopathic clients, the way Lemaricus Davidson’s defenders Doug Trant and David M. Eldridge did in seeking to save him from the death penalty for murdering Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom, in the Knoxville Horror case. In Davidson’s case, it didn’t work because of Davidson’s own stupidity, in refusing since disgraced presiding Judge Richard Baumgartner’s offer to racially rig the jury pool with blacks from neighboring Davidson County.

Killers like Davidson and Alfaro wouldn't be caught dead on the street with glasses on.

Memorial at the scene of the crime, early August, 2007.

Note that:

1. Alfaro and his fellow illegal alien invader fiends committed this atrocity almost four years ago, on August 4, 2007, and he is only now getting even a measure of justice;2. New Jersey does not have the death penalty, thus ensuring that Alfaro & Co. never meet justice;3. The odds are very much against any of these monsters dying of old age in prison; if they are not dispatched by fellow prisoners, they will surely see their sentences commuted at some point; and4. The Vichycon New York Post, whose owner, Rupert Murdoch, is addressed by his master, Al Sharpton, as “bitch,” devoted all of 130 words to the story.

James Harvey, father of Dashon Harvey, speaks at the sentencing of Alexander Alfaro

NEWARK — Alexander Alfaro has been sentenced this afternoon to 212 years in prison for his part in the August 2007 Newark schoolyard triple killings, following emotional testimony from parents and relatives of the college-aged victims.

Last month, a jury convicted Alfaro on 16 of 17 counts — including three counts of murder — in the brutal killings behind Mount Vernon School in the city's Ivy Hill section. Superior Court Judge Michael L. Ravin in Newark imposed the sentence. Alfaro must serve 180 years before he is eligible for parole.

Prosecutors said six young men set upon four college-age friends that night. Three of the victims were lined up against a wall and shot in the back of the head. They died. A fourth was shot in the face but survived.

Alfaro, 20, becomes the third defendant in the case to receive consecutive life sentences. His half brother, Rodolfo Godinez, was convicted last spring following a trial; and Melvin Jovel, who admitted he shot all four victims, pleaded guilty four months later. Three more defendants are still awaiting trial. Prosecutors have linked all six men to a violent Central American street gang, and have called the killings gang-motivated.

Alfaro, clad in a green jail uniform entered the courtroom in handcuffs, and wearing the same thick black eyeglasses he had on throughout trial. When Ravin asked Alfaro if he wanted to say anything, he stood up, and answered, “No, your honor.“ It was all he said.

His attorney, Raymond Morasse, argued for a lesser sentence, saying his client was forced into the gang life by Godinez, and never willingly took part in the killings.

Before imposing sentence, the judge, said while it was true Godinez had influence on the younger man, Alfaro "willfully embraced that gang. That’s the life he wanted. It enticed him." Alfaro, he said has accepted no responsibility for the crime, and has shown no remorse to the families.

Using graphic language and clearly angry, the judge said of Hightower's injuries, "the machete-wielding Alexander Alfaro hacked her head and hacked her body. . . The force he used to hack her skull with the machete was such that the blade was embedded in her skull and he had to pry the blade out. That’s the evidence. That’s the evidence of what he did.

That’s how Alfaro sent her to the after-life."

Killed that night were Iofemi Hightower and Dashon Harvey, both 20, and Terrance Aeriel, 18. Natasha Aeriel, 19 at the time and Terrance’s sister, was shot in the head but survived. Aeriel was in court today, did not speak.

During the month-long trial, Alfaro’s recorded statement to police following his arrest was played. In it, he admitted to cutting Hightower but said Godinez ordered him to do it. In unexpected testimony, Alfaro took the stand, saying it was Godinez, not him, who slashed Hightower with the weapon. He said Godinez, a menacing presence in his life, forced him into the gang life.

But Essex County Assistant Prosecutor Thomas McTigue, who handled the case, called Alfaro an active participant. He told the judge that Alfaro’s role in the killing “added an element of horror to it, which still reverberates through this community. Mr. Alfaro,” he said, “took a machete and savagely inflicted the terrible, terrible wounds” on Hightower that were “savage and barbaric, and they were personal.”

* * *

That’s 625 words in the main text alone, plus another couple hundred words in long captions to the many accompanying photographs, and links to other articles and videos on the case.

Someone is bound to say, “Yeah, but it was a Newark murder.” Newark is a half-hour from Manhattan on the PATH train, and a mass murder carried out by a gang, even of legal citizens, much less criminal invaders, is huge news an hour away, or at least it used to be, even to the New York Times.

But not to the Post. Not today’s Post, anyway. And even the Star-Ledger neglected to: 1. Name the killers’ gang: MS-13; 2. Note that the machete is the gang’s signature weapon; 3. Report that Alfaro was born in Nicaragua; 4. Mention that MS-13 now admits as members immigrants from all over Central and South America; 5. Or recount that the murders were execution-style acts of deliberate racial cleansing, based solely on the fact that the victims were black.

About Me

I am a dissident journalist, whose work has been published in dozens of daily newspapers, magazines, and journals in English, German, and Swedish, under my own name and many pseudonyms. While living in internal exile in New York, where I am whitelisted, I maintain NSU/The Wyatt Earp Journalism Bureau and some eight other blogs (some are distinctive but occasional venues, while others are mirrors), and also write for stout-hearted men such as Peter Brimelow and Jared Taylor. Please hit the “Donate” button on your way out. Thanks, in advance.
Follow my tweets at @NicholasStix.

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